Improved method of using explosive liquids for the production of light and heat



W. BESCHKE.

Method of Using Explosive Liquid's for the Production of Light and Heat. No. 57,245. Patented Aug. 14, 1866.

N. Pnans. Photo-Lithographer. wznhingtonjn. a

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

WILLIAM BESGHKE, OF PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA, ASSIGNOR TO HIM- SELF, P. H. VANDER I/VEYDE, AND L. STRAUS, OF SAME PLACE.

IMPROVED METHOD OF USING EXPLOSIVE LIQUIDS FOR THE PRODUCTION OF LIGHT AND HEAT. 7

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 57,2 15, dated August 14, 1866.

To all whom "it may concern:

Be it known that I, WILLIAM BESCHKE, of the city of Philadelphia, in the county of Philadelphia and State of Pennsylvania, have invented a new and improved perfectly safe system of using explosive fluids for illuminating and heating purposes, particularly gasoline, but also benzine, alcohol, spirits of turpentine, 850., and coal-oil generally; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full and exact description thereof, reference being had to the accompanying, drawings, taken from models made for"that purpose, and to, the figures and letters marked thereon.

The nature of my invention and its principal features consist in making for the use of explosive fluids generally, but of gasoline particularly, such eontrivances in lamps, bottles, cans, barrels, tanks, reservoirs, 850., whereby untimely or accidental ignition and eventual explosion of explosive and volatile fluid, particularly of gasoline and its vapor, are made impossible with them.

Before proceeding to describe their construction and operation, in order to enable others to understand and to use them, I must here make some remarks on explosive fluids and their vapors.

Explosive fluids generally, but coal-oil particularly, and gasoline still more particularly, generate vapor, and the dangerous explosiveness of both fluid and its vapor is increased in proportion to the heat produced by theflame, which rises to 125 Fahrenheit and eventually to 130 Fahrenheit, and even still higher, at the top of a burning lamp, by its connection with the point of combustion or the flame.

Gasoline of 89 or 90 gravity by Baumes hydrometer boils and evaporates before reaching a heat of 100 Fahrenheit, while benzine of 66 gravity does at 17 6 Fahrenheit. Gasoline of 89 gravity, which I use at present in my lamps, generates gas which gives abrighter and better light than that of common coalgas.

Explosive fluid and its vapor can only be ignited by a flame, and thus eventually explode, when exposed to a sufficient quantity of of air, by presenting to it a surface of sufficient size. When fluid or its vapor is ignited the size of its flame is in proportion to the size of the openings through which it passes and burns. With my lamps I use ordinary gas burners with very small cuts or holes.

For the purpose of preventing untimely ignition and eventual explosion of fluids and vapors in lamps, bottles, cans, barrels, tanks, reservoirs, &c., the system I have invented consists in producing in their interior, in which the explosive fluid is kept, very small cells, conduits, or channels, too small for allowing the flame to pass through them to ignite the fluid or its vapor and cause it to explode, but ever large enough for allowing the fluid and the vapor to pass easily and freely through them in every direction. The fluid passes by its gravity and capillarity, the vapor by its volatility and propensity to ascend.

As itwould be very difficult, or rather almost impossible, without great trouble and-expense, to construct such very small cells, conduits, or channels by mechanical contrivance, I do contrive to make them as follows: I fill the interior of the lamp partly with sawdust or any of its equivalents,combustible cotton, or iucombustible asbestus, beads of glass or stone, gravel, shot, or any of their equivalents, and partly I fill the interior of the lamp at the top with a body of wire-gauze or perforated thin plate, either rolled up like paper-scrolls or put flat together like book-leaves, or I fill the lamp with one material, either with sawdust or cotton as a combustible vegetable absorbent, or

any of their equivalents, or with asbestus or any of its equivalents as an iucombustible absorbent mineral, beads of glass or stone, gravel, shot, or any of their equivalents, with the ox ception of sand, which I disclaim and reject as an impracticable absorbent, because any such material allows fluid, vapor, heat, &c., but no flame, to pass through it, while its more or less strong capillarity causes the fluid to ascend, or at least otherwise to move when and where required for the purpose in view.

The application and adaptation of wiregauze or perforated thin plate, combined and shaped as mentioned, I put immediately under or near the point of combustion within the top of the burner, where it acts upward as a conductor of fluid and vapor, and simultane ously downward as a conductor of heat, and thus as an agent to generate gas, by causing the fluid to evaporate when and Where required for burning or illuminating and heating purposes.

My combination of ordinary Wicks of cotton or any equivalent is applied, not as one of burners, but only as that of auxiliary capillary conductors of fluid, with other portions of my system, in the interior of the lamps, between sawdust, beads, gravel, 850., and below the lamps is that they burn with almost equal regularity and always with equal safety from danger by untimely ignition or eventual explosion, whether their position be vertical or horizontal, or in any angle inclined upward or downward, or even turned upside down. This quality of my lamps I have illustrated by a number of figures in my hereto-annexed photographs, which I will below explain.

For the purpose of describing more fully my system of safety-lamps, safety-bottles, safetycans, 85c, I have made some models on a small scale, for which I refer to the hereto-annexed photographs, taken from them, on a still smaller scale.

Figure'l represents, in a glass bottle, a glass lamp filled with sawdust as an absorbent of fluid and vapor used in it for burning purpose; Fig. 2, one filled with small beads; Fig. 3, one filled with larger beads. In each of these three representatives of glass lamps is a glass tube, showing the inside of a burner filled at the top with a body of wire-gauze or of perforated thin plate, below it with asbestus, and below this with'cotton wick going through the sawdust down to the bottom of the lamp. From the lower portion of the inside of the lamp the fluid therein contained ascends by capillarity, and the vapor therein generated ascends, by its volatility, through the tube of the burner to its top, where the body of the wire-gauze or perforated thin plate causes the fluid, by the communicated heat, to become gas; or, in other words, to evaporate, rushing through the openings of the burner with perfect safety from dangerous action backward or downwardviz., from igniting the fluid or the vapor in the interior of the lamp, which cannot ignite or be inflamed, having no vacant space and no air in sufficient quantity for ignition or eventual explosion, either between the very small particles of the sawdust, or cotton, or asbestus, or beads, gravel, shot, 850., or between the wire-ganze or perforated thin plate. Fig. 4 is a tube representing a burner filled' below with cotton wick a, in the upper part with asbestus b, and with wire-gauzec or perforated thin plate at the top of the burner.

Fig. 5 shows different kinds and shapes of wire-gauze and perforated thin plate; a, coarse wire-gauze put flat together like book-leaves; b, fine wire-gauze put flat together likewise; c, coarse wire-gauze, and d fine wire-gauze, both rolled up like paper-scrolls. eis perforated thin plate put flat together; f, of the same kind rolled up; 9 and h, a fine'kind rolled up; i and j, of the same kind likewise.

Fig. 6 represents a safety-can on a small scale. aaisits main body; 1), its spout, the-inside of which is more distinctly shown on a larger scale by c. d is the top of the can, not yet soldered on, with the open tube of the feederepartly filled with rolledup wiregauze f, reaching down'to the bottom of the can,

resting on it for support, not to slip down and out of the tube, through which it allows the fluid to flow without allowing the flame to pass through and to ignite it inside or the vapor accumulated inside over the surface of the fluid. Thus the openings of the can may burn without any danger of igniting the fluid or the vapor inside; nor can the wire-gauze or the perforated thin plates thus rolled up or put flat together in the feeding-tube or in the spout be easily damaged or destroyed, except mischievously or violently.

Fig. 7 shows a glass bottle secured like the can, Fig. 6, by rolled-up wire-gauze reaching down to the bottom for firm support, while the elastic diverging pressure prevents it from slipping out of the bottle when inclined downward or turned upside'down.

Fig. 8 is an experimental lamp, on a small scale, not liable to explode, although it be not regularly hermetically closed in its connection between the main body a and the burner 12.

In this lamp the burner b can be taken out from the main body a while burning with two flames. The flame can be communicated from the burner 12 to the opening under a of the main body and thence to the lower end, 0, of the tube attached to the burner of this lamp only. This experiment is to show that and how my lamp may be damaged and leaky and burn from the inside without any danger of exploding.

Fig. 9 is an ordinary gas-burner, its top at having within a rolled piece of wire-gauze at c in the tube 7). Undercthe tube is filled with asbestus, 01, below which begins the cotton wick e in combination with the other portions of my system.

Fig. 10 shows the main body of my lamp, with the top not yet soldered on it. About half its inside is filled with sawdust a a, through which two cotton wicks go, from the lower ends of the two burners down to the bottom, their places being marked b and 0. In the center is a screw-pin, d, firmly connected with the bottom, on which pin the top, Fig. 11, of the lamp is screwed before being soldered on the main body. 0 e is a ring of wire-gauze, about as thick as high, rolled up, through which the fluid can easily and freely flow in every direction into the adjoining sawdust, while no flame can pass through it into the interior to ignite the fluid or the vapor filling it instead of the partly or wholly consumed fluid. The top of one burner, in Fig. 11, is open, showing the places of the openings for the flames where the wire-gauze or the perforated. thin plate begins.

Fig. 11 is the top of the lamp, with two burners and with two openings for the feeders, a. a, one being insufficient, for want of air in the closed lamp, to let the fluid easily pass through into it. The stoppers of the feeders can be screwed on and off. Being hollow and filled with wire-gauze or perforated thin plate rolled up together, they serve at the same time as eventual safety-vents, if there should ever be any superabundance of exp1osive vapor accumulating in the overheated lamp, although not even then can there be any possible danger of explosion, as no flame can reach the inside of the lamp through the safety system of the wire-gauze or perforated thin plate rolled up together, as before described.

Fig. 12 exhibits still more distinctly the safety system of the lamp. are is the lower portion of sawdust. ff is a star-shaped support, on which the ring 6 e rests. That shape is more distinctly shown in Fig. 13. One-half of the ring 6 e is shown resting on that support in Fig. 12, and also the central screwpin, marked d.

Fig. lelis the inner tube ofa burner filled with asbestus 0 between the two ends at b, which are filled, one with wire-gauze and the other with perforated thin plate, both rolled up together, as before described.

Fig. 15 is a burning lamp filled with sawdust and therein-absorbed gasoline, its mouth a a having a safety system of perforated thin plate rolled up together, as before described.

Fig. 16 shows the lamp of Fig. Sin a horizontal position, burning with two lights, and Fig. 17 the same standing and not burning.

Fig. 18 is an explosive lamp, made non-explosive by adapting to it my safety system, with which it burns brightly, without any additional appendage to prevent it from smoking.

Figs. 19 and 20 show, on a small scale, one of mylamps burning with four bright flames, standing upright, and also lying horizontal.

Figs. 21 and 22 are mere repetitions of the same lamp, only on a still smaller scale.

Figs. 23, 24, 25, 26, 27 show another kind of lamps-usual to burn alcohol with cotton wicks for gas-fitters purposes-to which lamp for two flames I have adapted some portions of my safety system-viz., sawdust, a cotton wick, (not as a burner, but only for auxiliary capillarity as a conductor of fluid,) asbestus, wire'gauze above and below it, and glass beads in the feeder. It illustrates particu-' larly the quality of burning with equal brightness, regularity, and facility in any given position, as shown by the photographs. These two lamps, one with four and the other with two flames, I have experimentally made and tested by burning them for at least one hundred hours, consuming about one and a half gallon of gasoline, at the expense of seventyfive cents or fifty cents per gallon.

Figs. 28, 29, 30, 31 show the same experiment in similar different positions, with a tube representing a torch, to which my system is adapted.

With my system I obtain the two first requisitions of good lamps-perfect safety and complete combustion.

I disclaim the use of sand or any of its equivalents as an absorbent, having found it tanks. reservoirs, &c., (the former to burn and the latter to retain and to transport gasoline or other explosive fluids,) with sawdust, cotton. asbestus, beads, gravel, shot, 850., and with wire-gauze or perforated thin plate, for the purposes specified.

In testimony whereof I have signed my name to this specification in the presence of two subscribing witnesses.

WILLIAM BESGHKE.

Witnesses:

VANDER WEYDE, M. D., M. SWENDEMAN. 

